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Homura Akemi
Homura Akemi is both a protagonist and an antagonist of Madoka Magica. She is first seen by Madoka in a dream of her fighting a monster in a desolate landscape of skyscrapers. The day after the dream, Homura has transferred to Madoka's school where she gives her ominous warnings. editGeneral Info I bet Urobuchi had something to do with this. * A smart, graceful, athletically-talented girl. Cool if not chilly, her personality even can even be seen in her posture. Her primary ability is to stop time, all her other abilities and attacks seem to come from non-magical items, such as firearms and bombs. Her time manipulation device can also allow her to travel back in time, act as a shield, and seems to act as a limitless storage facility. * She seems to be a magical girl, but there are a lot of mysteries surrounding the way she acts. Her fighting style is also unidentified. * Ms. Aoki’s Design Check: A blunt girl. I tried to let this shine through in her design. Her distinguishing point is her silky long hair. * Magical girl outfit: Homura was designed with her personality and combat style in mind. I found her fascinating right away. (Aoki) * The sharp lines of her upper back and jacket evoke her personality. Overall rather monochromatic. Her black tights have a diamond pattern. * School uniform: She wears black tights in uniform too, leaving her overall feel just like in her magical girl outfit. She gives off the air of a silent beauty. * Homura's height range, according to the Production Note, is 155-158cm (5'1"-5'2"). Her birthday, blood type and other biographical information is unknown at this time. * According to the Blu-ray episode 2 voice commentary, Ume Aoki found Homura to be the most difficult to come up with an image color but one of the easier ones for character design. * Regardless of her reasons, Homura'a priority is preventing Madoka from becoming a Mahou Shoujo. Since that is not understandable by other Mahou Shoujos or Madoka, she decided to act alone. * Homura is a magical girl from another timeline, as revealed by Kyubey. She knows that Kyubey is behind a sinister plot, and it mostly involves Madoka turning into a magical girl. * Homura's special ability is revealed to be some kind of time-travel, which explains why she knows so much to the point of knowing exactly when and where certain things will happen. This also may be why she can move at blistering speed. * Her house has a wall display of documents relating to witches. * In episode 9, it was revealed that Homura can stop time. However, anyone she touches while the ability is under effect will not be stopped. ** According to an interview in Otona Anime Vol. 20, translated by symbv, here is what Gen Urobuchi said on more of Homura's power: "The weapon that looks like Homura's shield is actually a sand timer. When the flow of the sand is blocked, time is stopped. And when there is no sand on the upper part of the sand timer and then the timer is reverted, one month's worth of time is turned back. But before that stage is reached, only time stopping is possible. This means the special power of Homura is the ability to manipulate one month's time's worth of sand in the sand timer. As for the time passed and then turned back, since it was not the focus in this work I did not think it through very thoroughly. I think you can say that the world split up and became parallel worlds there." In episode 11, we see Homura's sand run out in the middle of her fight with Walpurgisnacht, verifying this limitation of her time stop powers. * Homura's backstory was revealed in episode 10. She was a transfer student who was recovering from heart disease. Probably due to her lack of confidence, she was targeted by familiars. However, Madoka (who was a magical girl at this time) and Mami save her. During Walpurgis Night, Madoka and Mami die. Homura then makes the wish to re-do her meeting with Madoka to prevent her fate. * Along with stopping time, Homura can also reverse time to before her meeting with Madoka. * Homura, while initially ditzy and insecure, has become very independent and strong during her time traveling. Her cold nature is from her determination to save Madoka after having failed in her mission to prevent Madoka from becoming a magical girl countless times. * A previous Madoka was the one to task Homura to prevent Madoka from becoming a magical girl. * In the current timeline, Homura fails to stop Walpurgis Night. However, since Homura somewhat confessed to Madoka to the time traveling, Madoka creates a new wish to make sure that Homura's efforts weren't in vain. * Homura is the only one that remembers Madoka in the newest timeline. Also, she gains a bow and magical wings. Whether her time-stopping ability remains is unknown. * In the ending, Homura faces off with many demons in a desert. Her wings extend and reflects the universe, full of stars. * Homura uses her magic to heal her heart condition * Homura is the strongest of the magical girls as long as no one discovers the nature of her power. * At a Nitro+ Q&A Panel it was revealed that Homura went through almost 100 timelines. ''Q: How many timelines did Homura go through? A: Approaching 100.'' * Color Theme: Purple. * Soul Gem shape: Diamond. * Not to let Kyubey discover her ability, Homura never tell others about her wish. This might also be a reason why other magical girls don't believe her completely. editPersonality Since her arrival at Mitakihara Middle School, she is immediately depicted as being very intelligent, athletic, distant, and cold. It is revealed in episode 4 that she is only like this because she has seen so much suffering during her tenure as a magical girl. Because of this, she does not want Madoka to become a magical girl and tries to do anything in order to stop her from making a wish with Kyubey, going as far as to attempting to injure the cat-like creature. Despite her cold attitude towards others, she still very much cares for Madoka as it is her sole objective to protect her due to the countless amount blood, sweat, and tears she has shed over her jumps in time. In the original timeline where her journey began, however, Homura is portrayed as meek, shy, timid, and is known around the school for her lack of confidence. She was also known for her physical incapability of performing in P.E. class; she would get dizzy upon doing even the simplest of warm-up exercises. This had the unfortunate result of her being a target of bullying, as heard on Drama CD 1. Overwhelmed by her perceived uselessness, she begins questioning her existence and until she begins her fated friendship with Madoka, her feelings do not change. Madoka, alongside Mami Tomoe, shows her the ropes and dangers of becoming a magical girl and notes that Madoka's own attitude became much healthier with every witch battle. In an ironic twist, in the anime timeline we see how frail and meek Madoka is, compared to the current Homura whose personality had performed a complete 180-degree turn due to her experiences in multiple timelines. Despite being regarded as emotionless by Sayaka Miki, Homura is far from it. Although she does not easily show signs of remorse, sadness, or pity, it is only because she had grown used to the suffering around her. Homura herself has stated that she always feels badly with each life she unable to save or alter, but nevertheless, it does not slow her down from staying true to her main objective in saving Madoka. editHistory editBackground Prior to the events of the TV anime, Homura was hospitalized for a long period of time due to heart disease. The whereabouts and status of her family is unknown, as they are never mentioned in the series. In the original timeline, Homura at this point is physically frail and weak most likely due to her illness. editHomura in the Anime and Drama CDs The sequences of events in each timeline. editThe Original Universe with Witches (Events of the TV Anime and Films: Beginnings and Eternal) Homura's time-loop officially starts on the 16th of the month in the anime (speculated to be sometime between March and April). She was released from the hospital on the 16th, and transferred to Mitakihara Middle School on the 25th. In the original timeline, she is attacked by a witch and saved by Madoka and Mami. Sometime during the next month, during Walpurgisnacht, she becomes a magical girl while wishing to redo her meeting with Madoka, thus gaining the power to pause and/or rewind time one month. It is estimated Homura repeated the same month starting on the 16th nearly 100 times before the present timeline in the TV anime. Within these timelines, Homura was able to gradually improve her abilities and acquire items (such as ammunition and weapons from the Japanese military) to prepare for the battle with Walpurgisnacht. She was also able to memorize and deduce through statistics the major events that would occur within all timelines, giving her incredible knowledge about most of her adversaries. The corollary, however, was that Homura experienced the deaths of many of her friends repeatedly, often horrifically. As a general trend, Homura became increasingly distant to Madoka with each repeat of the month. By the timeline of the TV anime, Homura appeared as a cold and calculating character who is distant from all the characters. She failed to save all of her companions (apart from Madoka), and by Walpurgisnacht, was forced to face the witch alone. She was subsequently defeated by Walpurgisnacht, and seemed just about to succumb to despair before Madoka appears and rewrites the Universe with her wish. editThe New Universe created by Madoka (Epilogue of TV Anime and the Film: Rebellion) After Madoka's revision of the universe, Homura is the only known character to retain her memories of the previous universe. She has possession of Madoka's ribbon, and has a new black bow as her weapon similar to Madoka's weapon. It is unknown if she retained her abilities to manipulate time and space. Homura is shown to have a much closer relationship with Kyuubey, so much so she even confides an entire account about how the old universe worked. editThe New Universe created by Akuma Homura (Epilogue of the Film: Rebellion) editHomura in Oriko Magica * Homura first appears in Chapter 3. When Mami warns her about the magical girl murders, Homura seems not to care, but warns Mami not to get close to her, Madoka, Hitomi and Sayaka. * In chapter 4, she appears for one page with her friends, going out for sweets. She defers to Madoka's taste and doesn't care where they go. She protected Madoka well to this point, keeping the knowledge of magical girls far away from her and Sayaka. * In chapters 5-7, as Mitakihara Junior High is covered with a witch's barrier, Homura does her best to protect Madoka from the familiars. After Madoka told her not to sacrifice others to protect her, however, Homura decided to find Oriko and Kirika and defeat them. Oriko reveals that she knows about the end of the world caused by Kriemheld Gretchen, Madoka's witch form, and that she plans to kill Madoka before she can contract and cause that to happen. Homura fights together with Mami, Kyoko and Yuma, coming close to losing when two of the other three fall into despair afterseeing Kirika become a witch. They manage to pull themselves together and defeat her, and Homura kills Oriko. But since Oriko also killed Madoka by using the last of her power to shoot a piece of Kirika's witch body through Madoka's torso, Homura can do nothing but reset the timeline. editHomura in The Different Story * Homura acts just as she did in the anime. * Homura tries to cooperate with all magical girls to fight Walpurgis. But she still fails because all other magical girls don't believe her. ** When Sayaka becomes Oktavia, she warns Kyoko not to visit Mami or she may die. Kyoko refuses and set a barrier to stop her from following. ** She brings unconscious Mami home, and then seeks her help. ** She lies to Madoka, saying Sayaka is killed by witches. She doesn't want Madoka to know about the cold truth. ** When Madoka contracts, she doesn't reset time immediately. She tries to convince Madoka to run away, but Madoka refuses. She resets time after the other two go to fight Walpurgis. editHomura in the PSP Game editTrivia And so a legend was born * Homura's shield is able to store a countless amount of weapons, as demonstrated by the many pistols, light machineguns, shotguns, rocket launchers, and boxes of ammunition packed inside it. Note that her shield is relatively small and she is able to wear it around her wrist, much like a watch. * Homura is frequently referred to as "Homerun-chan" amongst Western fans, due to the similarity of the two names in Japanese, however she is frequently referred as "Homuhomu" (ほむほむ) within Japanese community. Homuhomu likely originated from the runes in Episode 3, one of which translates to "Homuhomu". ** "Homuhomu" can be used as a verb as "do Homuhomu" (ほむほむする) which means to caress, console or take care of. The action of "do Homuhomu" is not defined exactly. ** Originally started by the fan community it has been embraced and adopted by the industry to become part of the official language and usage. ** Sometimes also jokingly refered to as "Homurika" due to shared similarity of circumstances (having to go through many timelines to prevent a tragedy) with Rika Furude (Higurashi No Naku Koro Ni). * The first character for Akemi (暁) means "daybreak", while the second one (美) means beauty which is a famous letter in girl's name. * When her full name is written vertically in hiragana (あけみほむら) and covering the left half at a certain angle, it could be read as カナメまどか which is Kaname written in katakana and Madoka written in hiragana. * Her last name can also be used as a first name. * In an early production sketch, her surname was given as (暁海) "daybreak sea" instead of (暁美). Both are read as Akemi. * Her first name is written in hiragana, which has no special meaning. However, when written in kanji, it can mean: ** flame, blaze (炎 or 焔) ** heart on fire (心火) ** mass of flame (炎叢) ** village protector (保村) * Though only 焔, 炎, and 心火 are actually Japanese given names. The name 'Homura' can also be written the following ways as a given name: ** stride approaching happiness (歩向楽) ** head/point of the large village (穂邑) (*Fun fact: The name "炎子" or Homurako can also be read as "Moeko") * The official Chinese translation uses (焔) "flame, blaze" as the kanji for her first name. However, no official kanji of her name exists in the original Japanese version. Is this real life? * Some folks in 2ch nicknamed Homura's Residence Homu-home (ほむホーム Homuhōmu) since Homu is a nickname for Homura, and Hōmu is "home" rendered in the Japanese syllabary. It should be noted that "homu" is more often used for dog houses and similar structures, with the English word "home" expressed using "uchi" (うち, which refers to one's own house or household), "ie" (いえ, which can refer to a physical house or a family lineage), or the honorific "otaku" (お宅, which refers to someone else's house or household). * The Homura of previous timelines is, due to her personality and actions, often referred to as "Moemura" amongst Western fans. * Apparently there is a rumor on the net that some weapons went "missing" at the JSDF and US military bases in Japan. There is only one official report regarding the missing/stolen weapons. It is not known if the rumors of the stolen missing weapons inspired their appearance in the series. Nor is there any evidence indicating that the perpetrator was a time traveling magical girl. * One fan estimates that Homura used ¥ 1,383,040,300 Yen worth of military weaponry & equipment (that's $17,037,114 USD in today's dollars).1 * Homura's appearance in episode 12 (in the new timeline) from the manga is different than her appearance from the anime. In the anime, her clothes and hairstyle remain the same, with Madoka's ribbon as her accessories. However, in the manga, she wears a new dress, changes her hairstyle to two pigtails with the ribbons Madoka gave her. * In Audio commentary for Episode 4, Urobuchi liked Chiwa Saitou for the role because she had a "Dark Beauty" feeling. ** In the Audio commentary for Episode 7, Chiwa Saitou explains she tried the role of Kyubey and Kyousuke first, until Gen Urobuchi convinced her to try the role of Homura. *** Chiwa Saito explains that she found the character of Homura to be strong but also to be a weak/delicate girl. Aoi Yuuki adds that the Homura character had no other choice but to become strong. **** Ryouko Shintani states that would be true for a character that has something or someone important to protect. * Some pages from the Puella Magi Production Note refer to Homura's attack on Walpurgisnacht as "Pytha-homu Switch", a reference to the complicated Rube Goldberg machines featured on the Japanese children's show "Pythagorean Switch". * In the Puella Magi Madoka Magica Official Guidebook "You Are Not Alone" Hanokage jokingly describes Homura as "Hommando" in her After-Recording Report comic, because of the excessive vast arsenal of weaponry she unleashes in Episode 11. Apparently the smörgåsbord of weaponry was added later, they were not originally depicted in the early stages of the screenplay. * Chiwa Saito (Homura) states that the crying scene in Episode 8 left her with a large impression. She feels like they captured the feelings of a girl perfectly, specially the part where Homura collapses, showing her weak side as a girl. * In the audio commentary for Episode 11, Chiwa Saito (Homura) found the confession scene to be touching and emotional, and left her with a huge impression. She confesses that she cried. ** Aoi Yuuki (Madoka) found the scene to be amazing and filled her with emotions. Aoi Yuuki felt that her and Madoka became synchronized during the emotional scene. Aoi Yuuki believes that, surely Madoka would have accepted Homura's feelings. * In Persona 4 Arena, Yukiko Amagi has a palette swap for Homura. editObservations Episode 10 gave us Moemura * She wants to stop Madoka from making a contract with Kyubey * She has much knowledge about Mitakihara Middle School. * Is visibly upset when Madoka uses her last name or honorifics instead of the more intimate "Homura". * She was openly pursuing Kyubey until Kyubey made contact with Madoka. * She appears obsessed with Madoka's happiness and/or survival. * As of Episode 10, it is shown that Homura used to be a very shy and clumsy girl before she became a magical girl. Homura met Madoka and Mami when they were saving Homura from a witch, thus the three became friends. At the very end of that timeline, Madoka is killed and Homura asks Kyubey to turn her into a magical girl with her wish being "to meet Madoka again, but this time as the one protecting her, not as the one being protected". * She appears to live by herself; her residence only has her name on the nameplate, much like Mami's. In episode 10, when she wakes up in the hospital, no-one is there with her, and she seems to have been filling out the school transfer forms on her own. * She seem to have met Kyubey before, as she refers to him as "Incubator" in Episode 8 shortly after he was shot down by her. She also reveals to "know his true motives". * Her cold attitude was formed through re-living the same timeline multiple times, with the ending always being that Madoka either turned into a witch or died. When that happens, Homura turns back time to the first day of her arrival again. * When Mami asks Homura if she has any other power besides bending time in Episode 10, Homura steals guns, swords etc. from a locker. She hides these weapons inside her shield. * Homura calls everyone by their full name, giving the impression of being distant to people. This is most likely an attempt of her part to distance herself emotionally with everyone. ** In Episode 10, Moemura goes from formal to first name basis with Madoka. ** In Episode 9 when Kyoko sacrifices herself to save Sayaka, Homura calls her by her first name. ** The way she calls Sayaka varies on timelines. And she always refers to Mami as by her full name or Tomoe-san, probably because she is her senior. * She wears glasses and braided hair in her early insecure depiction shown in Episode 10. Later in that episode with renewed determination she undoes her braids and uses her soul gem to correct her vision. From then on she no longer required the use of glasses. * Homura finds a manual on how to make bombs from the internet. According with the Japanese Wikipedia the manual is titled Hara Hara Tokei (腹腹時計 Hara Hara Tokei), published in March 1974 by a far-left terrorist organization. ** Incidentally, the manual explains with illustrations that “Anyone with a middle-school level knowledge of chemistry can do it”. * Character Development: Prior to the events of Episode 1 (or timeline), from the very beginning Homura considered herself to be useless, and worthless. She didnt think people would miss her if she were to die or disappear. But Madoka was probably the first person to see Homura differently, for the good person that she was and opened her eyes that changed her way thinking about herself. With each time line, we start to see a transformation not only in Homura but with Madoka as well, where there is a role reversal. It is now Madoka who believes she is powerless and worthless, someone who cant even do anything to save her friends, and it is Homura who believes that Madoka is too kind and reckless for trying to do to much for others. * If Homura really did loop the same month nearly 100 times, she would technically be around 22 years old. editSpeculations The theories below have been proven right. At least one element from the franchise is rendering them valid. * In the first two episodes, Homura appeared to be the antagonist. It was later explained that she only wanted to prevent Madoka becoming a magical girl. She saved Madoka and Sayaka multiple times and may become an ally and/or mentor of Madoka in the future. * She might also wish to prevent Madoka becoming a magical girl because of the risk that she could turn into an overwhelmingly powerful witch. ** This has been proven right in Episode 10. * In Episode 5, Homura saves Sayaka from Kyoko by suddenly manifesting as Kyoko's attack is about to land, somehow moving Sayaka out of the path of the attack. The ability seems to involve massive acceleration rather than teleportation (this because of her power being to turn back/stop time and thus being able to move quickly from one point to another by stopping time temporarily), as she is able to act in a split second. As there are hints that a magical girl's powers may relate to her wish (e.g. Sayaka's regeneration), this may be a clue as to Homura's true motives. As ofEpisode 8 it has been confirmed that Homura's ability has something to do with time. ** Theory proven right: her power is stopping time and wish is time-related.) The theories below have been proven wrong. They are only kept here for the sake of completeness. the speculah madness. * Homura's wish was to protect Madoka, and since wishes always come true, it should make her immune from death and becoming a witch before saving Madoka. This makes her doomed to be locked in this cycle. In one timeline she was almost successful, but Madoka sacrificed herself for the sake of Homura and caused another restart. ** Theory proven wrong: Homura controls when and if she rewinds time, so long as one month has passed since the last reset.) * Per the image in the gallery below, the pipe layout on the corridor wall is completely different after Homura uses her 'teleportation' ability. Assuming this is not a production error, it has been suggested that the ability actually involves magically reconstituting the entire corridor while moving the people in it around. For more information, please refer to the entry on this phenomenon in the Magical Powers speculah. ** Theory proven wrong: her power has nothing to do with that, it was a production error. * Homura may be a homunculus created by Madoka.1 * Homura might be in possession of the soul gems of magical girls from an alternate timeline, such as the alternate Madokas. See also Speculah:Homura Identity Swap Theory (though note the identity swap theory has been debunked). ** Theory proven wrong: Soul Gems disappear when their owner dies or become Grief Seeds. * One of the speculations as for why Homura does not tell Madoka upfront of the consequences of becoming a magical girl, is because Madoka might just become one in order to save Homura or Mami. This could also be the reason why she's trying to keep a distance between her and Madoka. ** Theory proven wrong: she was doing it to stop Madoka per her promise. * Homura may be Walpurgis Night. As Homura's powers involved time manipulation it could very well be that we are seeing a witch version of Homura warped back into the past ironically becoming the very event that has shaped her reason for making a contract. Walpurgis Night has been depicted with clock-like gears underneath her dress. Episode 11 also depicts Walpurgis Night having a primary color of purple, which is also Homura's color. While the end of the series shows Homura losing her shield, after the credits we are shown Homura during an unknown time period, though having Madoka's ribbons, battling. Before Homura starts the fight, she hears Madoka offer words of encouragement as Homura gives up a final smile, which may signal Homura being consumed with despair. The final shot shows the main heroines, overlapped with multiple silhouettes of the heroines, which could allude to the familiars summoned by Walpurgis Night in episode 11, before showing Homura's soul gem. ** More to this is that it's actually a fact that Kriemhild Gretchen and Walpurgisnacht where designed, to be two halves of a whole, at least as far as physical character design goes. Because of that they form an hour glass. Now, One thing that really stands out is Gretchen, go take a look at her body if you haven't. Now this is really a strange witch for Madoka to become. Most witches have at least something in common with their original wish and past, but all Madoka appears to be is this stringy black mess, What could explain this? Well, if we accept that Walpurgisnacht nacht is in fact Homura's witch, sighting the gears and Homura's lack of a time barrier, It then follows that Homura's and Madoka's witches form the hour glass. The implications of that would not be trivial, To start with, Homura is the very cause of Madoka's power and potential as a magical girl, How does she do this? time loops, as Kyuubey explained, each loop makes Madoka's past bleaker and bleaker, We already know that blackness is despair incarnate since we see it build up in soul gems, Gretchen is of course VERY black. In addition to that, Gretchen is also made up of many tendrils of threads, It would seem that if she is the bottom of the hour glass, then It's plausible that the threads represent the very threads of time that Madoka is caught up in, Walpurgisnacht, if Homura, would then be intimately connected to Gretchen, the very cause of her power, each twist of time by Homura perhaps dropping those threads, symbolic of their relationship to one another. *** Theory proven wrong: Homura's witch form is Homulilly. **** However, there is nothing to confirm or deny that a witch would change appearance while fusing with other witches, so the theory may still hold some truth. **** Homura technically doesn't have a witch form at all as she is only magical girl who has never turned into it. Nutcracker witch(Homulilly) has appeared only in fake Mitakihara, while Homura's real soulgem was unbroken. Her final form, Akuma Homura, is more than a witch as she told about herself. The theories below have not been proven yet. Please keep in mind that they are fanmade theories, and not official material. * Homura may actually be Faust, as Faust in the play tries all his might to save Gretchen (Madoka) from dying but in the end she perishes anyways as Mephistopheles (QB) tries to tempt her to form a contract with him. ** There's also the fact that in the Goethe version, Faust would only lose his soul if he ever had a moment of perfect happiness that made him wish he could stop time at that moment forever. Homura's power, of course, is to stop time. As such, it's entirely possible that the Homura and Faust parallels will be taken to its logical conclusion: She will have a moment of perfect happiness, she will stop time at that moment, and then she will die or become a witch. However, it should be mentioned that Faust manages to escape Mephistopheles and enter heaven because he found his moment of happiness in helping others, and not in anything Mephistopheles gave him. On the other hand, there is a witch that tries to create heaven on Earth. ** In the story of Faust, the devil grants him "magical powers" for 24 years, "one year for each hour of the day," and the deal was at the end of the "24 years," the devil would claim his soul. Homura's "weapon" is an hourglass, and her hourglass can reset time by one month. Given the strong parallels to Faust, and how at the end of the last loop, Homura was about to lose her soul (by giving in to Kyuubey's master plan and her Soul Gem becoming corrupted), it is entirely probable that her loop lasted for a total of 24 months/loop attempts as a reasonable conservative estimate, and the full Faustian 24 years as a more gruesome estimate. Given how radically her personality has changed since the first loop attempt, and how she seems to have memorized most of the key events of the loop, 24 months seems like a plausible number. * Homura shows some very different powers in episode 12. While this may be a by-product of the new world, it is also possible she always had these powers and simply did not use them in favor of her less magic-consuming time-stopping. ** Given the fact that she no longer has her shield on her wrist, it is most likely that her powers have changed altogether. *** Her shield was shown to be completely out of sand during the fight with Walpurgis Night. As we know, the only way for her to get more sand again is to reset the timeline (flip the hourglass). Since the timeline wasn't actually reset by her, even in new timeline, her shield would still be completely out of sand, and therefore, useless as anything but a hunk of steel on her arm. It makes sense she wouldn't use it anymore, then. **** Considering her wish was to protect Madoka, one could believe her shield shows her resolve to protect. Its turning to sand in the Walpurgis Night fight represents her inability (and indeed, her failure) to protect Madoka. When she flips the hourglass, gaining more sand represents the fact she can protect Madoka again. Her not having it in the new timeline shows that she doesn't need to protect anyone anymore. *** As for the source of her new powers, speculations abound; lead amongst them is that she got Madoka's bow from her at the same time that Madoka fixed her Soul Gem and gave her her ribbon. Another theory is that since her wish was to "protect Madoka," and Madoka is now a concept rather than a person, her powers were altered into something similar to what Madoka uses. Yet another theory is that with the universe restarted, Homura made a different wish, and so got different powers. Yet another theory is that Homura was always able to produce a bow; after all, her original concept artwork depicted her with that weapon. She just hadn't figured out how, or alternatively, just hadn't bothered, since stopping time is more efficient. **** My (slightly poorly-founded) theory is that her wish was to know what Madoka was (which explains why she can suddenly tell Kyubey everything) - if that's true, her having a bow represents her bond with the concept of Madoka. Kind of similar to your point. * The reason why Homura can't prevent Madoka from being a magic girl may be interpreted that it is Madoka's being magic girl that makes Homura become magic girl. If Homura really did, there will be a paradox. But effect can't change the cause. Therefore,no matter how many times she tries, she is destined to fail. ** Another evidence may support this idea. In the end of episode 12, Homura is still a magic girl and she know the existence of Madoka. Because it is Homura's being magic girl and her trying hundreds of times to save Madoka that gives Madoka the ability to become Madokami. Even Madokami can't change what she is based on to exist. The effect can't change the cause. * There are some bizarre elements that haven't been properly addressed in the anime series. In one case is the issue that the production notes state that in one timeline Kyousuke was a guitarist. It was never addressed in the Anime but in the alternate-Oktavia's witch card does mention a guitar, and we have no reason to assume it refers to anyone but Kyousuke. On this reason Kyousuke as a guitarist is considered to be canon. One possible explanation for this is that Homura is not only going back in time but also going to parallel universes (different universes) contained within the multiverse. ** This theory may not be fundamentally sound, by the way "time traveling" would work in a multiversal world. Time traveling is sometimes colloquially divided into two types; Type A in which a character can travel back in time and "re-do" a period of time without encountering themselves, or Type B in which a character travels back in time and discovers a second version of themselves. Type B is generally thought to be the result of traveling into parallel time or different universe, with its own set of characters which may or may not reflect in the original universe's reality. Every time Homura travels back in time, she does not encounter a copy of herself, and thus this may be logically excluded. Gen Urobuchi stated that he didn't really think too much about the mechanics of Homura's time loops, so the nature of Homura's power is not only a mystery, but it is not fully understood not even by the creative source. There are ways to explain the change in instrument using only time travel. Perhaps someone made a wish that changed Kyousuke's past, and the effects persisted in future timelines because the wish changed events that happened before the point where the timelines diverged, when Homura woke up in the hospital. Kyousuke might be proficient with both instruments, and some event during the time loop period might inspire him to prefer one over the other. However, these speculations are based on guesswork, since the show's creators have not yet provided details. * Homura shows many traits of a textbook psychopath, as explained in detail here. * She also shows many traits of an emotional abuser, and shows very controlling and abusive behavior towards Madoka. * Homura might have known smart because those question(s) were maybe the same from timeline 1.